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The present work aimed to provide a basis for examination of intake of selected food items determined with a semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire (SQFFQ) and planned-food selection (PFS). From February to July of 2003, ninety one cancer patients and 90 matched (same sex and age within 5 years) non-cancer patients were directly interviewed by trained interviewers using the designed questionnaire at the inpatient-department of Viet Duc hospital, Ha Noi City, Viet Nam. Study subjects consumed more SQFFQ-food items than PFS-food items, so that the latter method might not accurately reflect dietary habits regarding estimation of nutrient intake, especially vitamins. Because these are beneficial factors acting against cancer development at many sites, the absence of food items selected by SQFFQ may result in a poor database regarding possible confounding factors. For futher clarification we then focused on vitamin C contributions of Vietnamese food and analyzed data of the National Nutritional Household Survey in 2000: 7,686 households throughout the country (vitamin C intake status) and 158 households with 741 persons of the population of Hanoi city (individual food items contributing to vitamin C). Direct interview using a validated questionnaire with an album of current Vietnamese food items-recipes and weighing checks was conducted to obtain information regarding all types of food intake over the last 24-hours. Contribution analysis using the Nutritive Composition Table of Vietnamese Foods, revision 2000, and stepwise regression analysis was applied. Average intake adjusted by ages of vitamin C per person per day was estimated. In total, the study subjects were found to currently consume 184 food items. Average intake of vitamin C was 72.5 mg per person per day at the national level: 57.9% from leafy vegetables, 33.4% from fresh fruits, and 6.4% from non-leafy vegetables. For vitamin C contribution, the highest 25 food items contributed to a cumulative 95.3% of vitamin C intake with a cumulative R2=0.99.

The International Collaborative Epidemiological Study of Host and Environmental Factors for Stomach and Colorectal Cancers in Southeast Asian Countries (SEACs) has been conducted in Viet Nam from 2003 to 2008 on a case-control basis. For further effective primary prevention, we examined gastric and colorectal cancer mortality nationwide in eight regions of Viet Nam in 2005-06.Both demographic data and lists of all deaths in 2005-06 were obtained from all 10,769 commune health stations in Viet Nam. Five indicators included name, age, sex, date of death and cause of death was collected for each case. We selected only communes having the list of deaths with clear cause for each case and crude mortality rate for all causes from 300-600/100,000 as published by the Ministry of Health for a reasonable accuracy and completeness. Obtained data for all causes, all cancers, stomach and colorectal cancer deaths as well as demographic information were processed using Excel software and exported to STATA 8.0 for estimation of world age-standardized cancer mortality rates per 100,000.Data were available for 1,246 gastric cases, (819 male and 427 female) with age-standardized mortality rates from 12.7 to 31.3 per 100,000 in males and from 5.9 to 10.3 per 100,000 in females in the 8 regions of the country. For colorectal cancers, 542 cases (268 male and 274 female) gave mortality rates from 4.0 to 11.3 per 100,000 in males and from 3.0 to 7.8 per 100,000 in females.Stomach cancer mortality in males in the region of North East in the North Viet Nam (2005-06) was higher than that in Japan (2002) (31.3 versus 28.7 per 100,000) while colorectal cancer in Viet Nam was lower. While prevalence of Helicobacter pyloris infection in Viet Nam was from 70-75% in both males and females, the stomach cancer rate in males was significantly higher than in females, 31.3 versus 6.8 per 100,000, suggesting an influence of other environmental risk factors. Whether protective factors are operating against colorectal cancer in Viet Nam now needs to be explored.